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Best pop/click/surface noise software?

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Deacon Jubal

Active Member
I'm hoping I'm not the only one here that is archiving to digital. I'm looking for recommendations for software that can do a good job with click/pop/surface noise without wrecking the music. Right now, I'm going with Audacity's noise removal, but it is very limited. I've also tried Adobe Audition- it is too drastic and makes the music sound robotic.

Thanks for any suggestions.
 
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Clickrepair. Find it here to try out first.

Best settings I've found are:
First do a Click Removal with DeClick at 50%, DeCrackle at Off, Automatic: All, Pitch protection and Reverse checked and Method:x3.

Then do a Decrackle, with DeClick:Off, DeCrackle at 50, Reverse: Checked and method:x3.
 
I zoom in on only the worst pops and look at the duration of it. I copy a section of sound preceding, of similar duration, and paste it over the pop. Other than that, it all stays.
 
SaSi said:
Clickrepair. Find it here to try out first.

Best settings I've found are:
First do a Click Removal with DeClick at 50%, DeCrackle at Off, Automatic: All, Pitch protection and Reverse checked and Method:x3.

Then do a Decrackle, with DeClick:Off, DeCrackle at 50, Reverse: Checked and method:x3.
Click to expand...

Strongly agree about this software-- easy to use, very reasonably priced and works superbly. I generally don't use the de-crackle much for LPs, but on 78s it can be a benefit. The trial download is a fully working version. When the trial expires (or anytime before) you can pay and get a key to unlock it.

Note that this is only denoising software-- you will still need an audio editor for anything else. I've used and been fairly satisfied with Nero Wave Editor for several years now. ( Comes bundled with all the other Nero stuff, but you can custom install only the modules you want. )
 
I've found most (..all) noise removal software I've used in the past has had some detrimental effect on the source......although I haven't tried "click repair" mentioned earlier.

For Click and Pop removal, I've used "Magix Audio Cleaning Lab" for years, and it works well. It's also an audio editor, so that you can do a bit of cutting and pasting if you need to, and it's got a great little spectral cleaning function which lets you highlight a large pop or click and do a instant blend between the unaffected sections.

It's just an inexpensive consumer program but I've found it effective, and dead easy to pick up....:thmbsp:
 
Deacon Jubal said:
I'm hoping I'm not the only one here that is archiving to digital. I'm looking for recommendations for software that can do a good job with click/pop/surface noise without wrecking the music. Right now, I'm going with Audacity's noise removal, but it is very limited. I've also tried Adobe Audition- it is too drastic and makes the music sound robotic.
Click to expand...

Adobe Audition doesn't have to be 'too drastic'; you need to set up the 'levels' it uses. The same goes for GoldWave, though the default setting for click/pop removal is pretty conservative. the residual clicks an be isolated and excised using either app by zooming in. If you keep the excisions shorter than 40 milliseconds or so, they are undetectable during playback.

Surface noise is trickier. You need to make trials, starting at conservative settings, and gradually increase their aggressiveness until you begin to lose music; then back off a step. Personally I don't mess with surface noise, my hearing isn't reliable enough.
 
I haven't messed with copy vinyl to digital in a couple of years, but when I was, I tried five or six different WAV editors. The best one I found was Wave Repair. It has a very good declicking function and also the best surface noise removal I found. I found that to get good sounding WAV files, it's very important to correct DC offset before doing any type of noise reduction or editing.
 
*** You could tell it was edited (subtle...but you could tell on a detailed system)....they sounded fine in my car stereo. I only used the software for a month. Maybe long term users have had better luck with different settings. ***

Taking the time to experiment with different settings for different recordings is crucial on any software NR system. While ClickRepair work very well with many recordings on the default settings, reducing the declick settings from the midpoint (the default) to a lower setting causes the program to miss some minor clicks but excises the larger ones without disturbing the rest of the audio, at least to my ears.

One nice feature (that other programs may have, but I can't comment on those I haven't used, of course) with CR is that during the processing operation, you can select to hear just the noise output-- what was removed. It's fairly easy with a little practice (and especially headphones) to hear when the processing is too aggressive and the music is getting removed along with the noise pulses. If so, you just abort the processing, reset the controls, and start again.

BTW, I mentioned Nero Wave Editor before; the declicker it has actually works fairly well. If you already have or purchase the software for editing you may find the declicker suitable also. Again, you need to fiddle with the settings a mite depending on the recording condition.
 
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It's been a lot of years since I did this sort of thing, so everything available back then has surely been superseded by better things by now. But for what it's worth, I have not one, but TWO tracks (hey, the "rules" didn't specify only one entry) on this CD:
http://www.pmerecords.com/AudioRestore.cfm
I didn't even remember the declicking software I used (something moderately priced, and really meant for LP's rather than 78's or, um, cylinders) until I looked up my description on that page. Looks like it's still around:
http://www.wavecor.co.uk/
 
I bought CoolEWdit before Adobe bought them out. I use ClickFix plug in with it and find it excellent. Amazing set of features, fo example, you can run it against a saved WAV file and only save the bits it removes. Then you can listen to what is saved and if you hear any 'music' reduce the settings and run it again. Jeffrey Klein is the chap who developed it. I believe the latest versions will run on the Adobe version.
 
clickrepair is excellent

I have not found better esp. at that price point. Nothing comes close for under $100.

They keep improving it too. Most other inexpensive programs garble the sound their algorithms are just not as good as Click Repair.

It is worth the time to download and try a few different ones -- they all offer free trials.

Best, Stephanie
 
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Seriously, a good cleaning with a vacuum record cleaning machine will be the best noise reduction technique you can use. I thought I was doing a good job cleaning my records until I started using a vacuum RCM. The difference was dramatic.

I've been using Diamond Cut DC Art software for at least a decade. They continue to make improvements and the latest version, DC8 is well worth the price. It has a series of "EZ" tools that will cover 90%+ of your needs. However, if you need to do more extensive work, it has a set of expert tools that allow you to fine tune filters to get the best result without degrading the music.

I do more than just LP's and 45's. I have a fairly large collection of 78's and because of their increased noise level it takes a powerful software tool like DC8. I've compared my restorations of certain records to commercial restorations using the CEDAR system and mine are as good and sometimes better.

I also use it for other projects. I'm digitizing some "Living Letters", reel to reel tapes a friend and his family shared while he was stationed in Korea in the 1960's. Some have 60 cycle hum, tape hiss and other anomolies that I'm able to quickly eliminate.

Try the tools mentioned. Diamond Cut has a fully functional free trial. See what you think.
 
DougMac said:
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Seriously, a good cleaning with a vacuum record cleaning machine will be the best noise reduction technique you can use. I thought I was doing a good job cleaning my records until I started using a vacuum RCM. The difference was dramatic.
Click to expand...
I agree, cleaning the record is actually the first step, and a vacuum system is substantially better than (almost) anything else.

I've had many LP's come so clean with vacuum cleaning that there's hardly an audible click on them. For others, there's that glue thing I've been experimenting with lately, and THEN there's digitizing and the declick software.

Back to declicking, I recall WaveCorrector would sometimes pick up sharp-sounding instruments such as castanets as clicks. I've heard where it's good to digitize at a higher sample rate, where the clicks have sharper ramps and a lot more ultrasonic content than any music, and thus are more easily discriminated from musical content. Does anyone know more about that, and what software takes advantage of a higher sampling rate? Or do they all do that nowadays?
 
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